


Once My Flame

by granger_danger



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: F/M, First Love, Fluff and Angst, Friends to Lovers, Harry Potter Epilogue What Epilogue | EWE, Implied Sexual Content, Lovers to Friends, No Underage Sex, Post-Hogwarts, Romance, Some Humor, Underage Minor Dating Someone of Age
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-27
Updated: 2020-04-27
Packaged: 2021-03-01 16:39:49
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,953
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23590201
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/granger_danger/pseuds/granger_danger
Summary: So dizzying was her entrance that Hermione had barely taken in the lush surroundings when she spotted a very distinctive face, illuminated in profile, from across the hall. Her eyes locked on the unmistakable man, lit by floating candles and standing against a backdrop of plum velvet curtains.Nobody had told her that he'd be here.*Hermione Granger and Viktor Krum meet again at a Ministry gala and are forced to face the various layers of their shared past.*
Relationships: Hermione Granger/Viktor Krum
Comments: 107
Kudos: 283
Collections: Sing Me a Rare: The Mash-Ups





	Once My Flame

**Author's Note:**

> Written for Sing-Me-A-Rare: Mash Ups. Much love to my alpha [scullymurphy](https://archiveofourown.org/users/scullymurphy/) and my beta [PacificRimbaud](https://archiveofourown.org/users/PacificRimbaud/pseuds/PacificRimbaud) for making this story better. Any errors are my own! 
> 
> Song Prompt - When We Were Young - Adele  
> Song Prompt - Shadowboxer - Fiona Apple
> 
> Voted Overall Winner Runner-Up, Best Romance, Best Fluff, Best Happily Ever After, Best Male Lead, The One We Wish Was Longer, and The Pairing You Didn't Know You Needed Runner-Up.

**everybody loves the things you do  
** _Saturday, August 27, 2011_

_Welcome to the Second Annual Ministry for Magic Gala for British Wizarding Achievement_

Hermione scowled up at the banner hanging above the entrance to the ballroom and sighed, girding herself. 

Another Ministry-sanctioned to-do. Another gala to attend alone. Another night of being bored to tears in a constrictive gown by centenarian Wizengamot members.

And wasn’t the theme unnecessarily nationalistic? Didn’t it all smack a bit of imperialism? 

Why, again, had she ever gone into politics?

The actual work, and the impact that it made — that she loved. This bit, though, she could do without. She had never excelled at false smiles or easy charm.

Smoothing the chiffon skirt of her slate blue dress, Hermione took a deep breath and summoned her power, her dignity, and a dazzling smile. She pushed the heavy carved teak door open and was swept into the revelries amidst a smattering of flashbulbs. The event was just beginning, and a string quartet was playing a lovely piece that was heavy on cello. She glimpsed Harry and Ginny by a table laden with hors d’oeuvres and managed to wave. Then the Chief Warlock was kissing her knuckles. A journalist from _Witch Weekly_ was asking about her dress. A free elf being paid fair wages — she had made sure of that — was pressing a champagne flute into her hand. 

So dizzying was her entrance that Hermione had barely taken in the lush surroundings when she spotted a very distinctive face, illuminated in profile, from across the hall. Her eyes locked on the unmistakable man, lit by floating candles and standing against a backdrop of plum velvet curtains. She stilled, her smile frozen as Myrna Nightberry from the Wizengamot droned on about the unparalleled superiority of British wizardry.

His jaw had broadened, though his frame, well-displayed in black-tie dress robes, was still lithe and densely muscled. Why did men always become ham-headed as they got older? In any case, it suited him. He’d kept the beard, which she had always been fond of. He was still a bit awkward on land, but no one could deny that he was handsome in an alluringly unconventional way. She felt her throat go dry. His bone structure lived in her muscle memory, even after all these years. It occurred to her, not for the first time, that Elena was very lucky. 

Of course, he’d collected a small crowd of admirers. He was gesturing with his drink as he spoke, dispensing small, polite smiles. 

Just then he turned and saw her, his dark eyes indecipherable as he met her gaze. She smiled, not at him so much as into him, employing her secret smile reserved only for him. She hadn’t meant to do it, and she regretted it immediately. Her cheeks burned as she turned her face away.

Nobody had told her that he’d be here. Although she should have expected it. She had read, of course, about his impending return to Hogwarts. 

“See someone you know?” Myrna asked, craning about. 

“Someone I used to know. An old school friend,” Hermione answered, which wasn’t _entirely_ untrue. 

Her dear old friend and erstwhile penpal. Her childhood sweetheart. Her secret lover from her year abroad and the odd night since. 

The one who got away. Somewhat. 

The one and only Viktor Krum. 

* * *

**everything just takes me back  
** _Saturday, April 21, 2001_

Wearing only an old Bulgaria Quidditch jersey, Hermione padded out of the bedroom. She tiptoed quietly past Viktor, who was doing his morning breathing exercises on his meditation cushion, and busied herself with preparing coffee. 

Aquila swooped through the open window and dropped both _The Daily Prophet_ and a wizarding paper in Cyrillic onto the counter. The sea air smelled divine but brought a slight chill in the mornings, so Hermione lazily summoned a cardigan from the other room and sat down with her coffee and the news. Not feeling quite ready to face the gossip column, she lowered the paper. 

Viktor’s flat was small and humble, tucked into an aging Muggle building only a few blocks from the Black Sea.  
  
He had a decoy flat, of course, in a posh wizarding condominium complex in Sofia with press and groupies perpetually thronged outside. Hermione had only seen it once, briefly; it was an empty tomb of chrome and black marble, approximately what would be expected of an international Quidditch superstar. He did photoshoots there sometimes. 

Viktor’s real flat, though, in Varna, was rented under a false name. A fifth-floor walk-up with a narrow staircase, it had high ceilings and plaster walls and what her mother might have optimistically called character. On a good day, it even approached charm. 

Viktor didn’t own much, but what he did have was selected and arranged with care. On his otherwise bare desk, a gray leather journal with a slim red ribbon stitched into the spine rested next to a large black quill. Whenever he came home, he would carefully deposit important items on a small table near the door: a burgundy velvet Galleon pouch; three brass keys on a simple ring; his hornbeam wand. Every surface had the artful simplicity of a museum exhibit. 

Yet the sense of order was effortless and fairly cozy. The walls weren’t completely sparse; he had hung a Durmstrang pennant and a banner for the Bulgarian team. Aquila, Viktor’s Imperial Eagle, preened haughtily from his perch in the corner, having adequately performed his day’s duties. On one wall, three of Viktor’s retired brooms hung at jaunty angles. The trophies, though, were left to gleam in solitude back at the decoy flat. 

To Hermione’s abject horror, Viktor had only one narrow bookshelf, but everything on it was unquestionably a masterpiece. Hermione’s own unruly book piles, which had first appeared and then multiplied in various corners, were a point of good-natured contention between them. 

Every piece of furniture was high-quality and immensely functional. The hardwood floor of the sitting room was covered with an exquisite enchanted Persian rug, its woven dragons occasionally rearing and snorting against their crimson backdrop. In cooler months, the fireplace was always lit, but a false spring had lulled them into complacency and today the hearth was cold. There was enough scarlet and gold to make Hermione feel fully at home; the overall effect was the Gryffindor Common Room as reimagined by someone with slightly less optimism and a far greater respect for minimalism.

She felt fully at home indeed. 

Just then, a scops owl winged into the room and nervously dropped a pink scrap of paper in front of Hermione, then hopped from foot to foot expectantly. Aquila eyed the interloper with disdain, then turned his resentful gaze to Hermione as she shook out a couple of bird treats. 

Sighing, Hermione unfolded the note and immediately recognized Matilda’s clumsy cursive. _Are you dead?,_ the note read in full.

Matilda was theoretically Hermione’s roommate, and she sent Hermione the same note nearly every morning.

 _Not yet,_ Hermione wrote back, then smiled cheekily to herself as she added an _xo_. She strapped the note onto the tiny bird, who gave a satisfied chirrup and flew away. 

Hermione didn’t technically live at Viktor’s flat. But it wouldn’t be completely incorrect to say that she didn’t _not_ live there either.

There was plenty that she and Viktor had not ever formally discussed.

Fine, she basically lived there and had since September. The longer it went on the less she prepared she felt to speak to him about it explicitly. Hermione sipped her coffee and pushed this unwelcome thought back to some lesser broom cupboard of her mind. 

Hermione had just turned her attention to the headlines in earnest when Viktor plodded out on heavy feet and shot her his secret smile, the one reserved only for her. His thick black hair fell around his ears now, and he kept a trim beard. She admired him with a naked gaze: his Roman nose and intense dark eyes, his wiry frame beneath his white undershirt, his strong arms and legs, the familiar bulge of his dark briefs. Viktor came up behind her, his warm arms enveloping her. He leaned over to press soft kisses into her neck, her ear, her shoulder, her unruly mane. She shivered happily into his touch, her belly tightening with want.

“Good morning,” she said with a grin, turning her head back over her shoulder to meet him in a sloppy kiss. “Are you going for a run, or can we go back to bed?” She raised a suggestive brow.

“Later,” he groaned happily, nipping playfully at her shoulder. “But this morning, we go to the sea.” 

“Okay.” Hermione stood to face him, smiling easily as she twined her arms around him and backed him into the wall.

Aquila observed them skeptically. 

“Later though,” Viktor promised, his eyes hungry as his hand drifted down over the slope of her arse. 

“Aquila still hates me,” Hermione said, squishing her face indignantly at the bird, who was side-eying them rather spectacularly.

“Oh, that look is for me,” Victor said with a grin. “He’s still mad about his name.”

“You _are_ rather literal.” Hermione smirked at him, and Viktor booped her on the nose before pulling her in for another kiss. Aquila shook out his wings scornfully and turned to face the wall.

Another kiss, and then they dressed in light jumpers and Apparated to a little-known beach frequented only by Muggle locals, where neither of them would be likely to encounter any fans. Spring sunlight filtered through storybook cumulus clouds, lending them a divine glow. Hermione’s heart still tightened when she took in the verdant bluffs, the sapphire sea with its impossible blues. Viktor’s sturdy hand was clasped firmly in hers, and he squeezed it three times. 

The dreamy idyll of a morning shattered abruptly, as it inevitably did, amidst the crowded markets of Varna’s wizarding district. 

They had a system. Hermione Apparated first, then bent her head as she marched towards the bookshop where an English translation of Magical Bulgaria: A Wizarding History awaited her. She tried not to break her stride when she heard the tell-tale squealing that signaled Viktor’s arrival. Much like Orpheus or Lot’s wife, she knew from experience not to look back. And yet, she turned her head over her shoulder, schooling her features into a casual neutrality in case she had attracted a rogue paparazzo. 

A petite brunette with impeccable make-up was pulling down the neck of her top, giggling as she apparently entreated Viktor to sign the upper portion of her left breast. 

Hermione snapped her head back, gritting her teeth beneath her public smile. It wasn’t that she was jealous, she told the knot in her stomach. What she was feeling was clearly about the ludicrous nature of celebrity and not about the fact that her unofficial secret almost live-in boyfriend was asked to autograph bosoms on an alarmingly regular basis. 

Viktor arrived back at the flat with his custom gloves from the Quidditch shop and immediately assuaged the lump in her throat by kissing her back into the bedroom. 

He pressed her against the wall, his knee gently parting her thighs, and she could almost forget the spectre of the ubiquitous Quidditch fan. 

He pulled back and looked at her like she was the first person who had ever really seen him, and she could almost forget that they’d been penned up in a hidden flat playing house for the better part of a year without once having a real conversation about it.

He lowered her to the bed and brought his mouth hungrily to her neck as he brushed a thumb over her covered nipple, and she could almost forget that his contract stipulated that he could not have a public relationship without an accompanying engagement. 

And that perhaps Dimo was right, on multiple counts. 

But when Viktor divested them both of their clothing and hovered over her, his beard brushing her stomach as he kissed his way lower, she became insensible to the anxious voice in her brain and instead fully inhabited her body.

And when he tugged down her knickers and buried his face in her as she gripped his coarse hair with both hands, she did forget. For a few blissful minutes, a few blissful hours at a time, she let herself forget. 

And that was how it was most days, and that was how it had been for more than seven months. 

It had been good, unbelievably good.

But all good things must eventually come to an end. 

* * *

**once my lover, now my friend  
** _Saturday, August 27, 2011_

Viktor had obtained a tumbler of firewhisky, neat, and was doing his best to disappear into the drapes, but his efforts were unsuccessful. A small crowd had formed — Quidditch fans, his future colleagues, sweaty dignitaries. He attempted to smile without grimacing and present the facade of being comfortable in social groups of more than five.

He could feel someone staring at him. He had been famous for long enough that this was not especially unusual, but the sensation was so singular that he could not ignore it any longer. He turned his head. When he saw her, he nearly stopped breathing.

Hermione Granger was a vision, elegant in muted blue silk and lace. He could not help but remember the Yule Ball, how she’d been breathless and laughing in a cloud of periwinkle satin as he had waltzed her across the Great Hall. 

She smiled at him now, not her public smile but her private one, as though she were still in love with him. Bile rose in his stomach at her sheer audacity. There was no way she didn’t know what she was doing. 

Hermione swept towards him, and of course he was enraptured. She held herself with poise, but her eyes flashed with the same passionate fire. Her curls had been partially tamed and were far sleeker than usual, but they spilled out freely over her shoulders.

Viktor remembered standing behind her, kissing her neck as she had prepared for some formal civic event or another: one of several that he had not attended with her in the year they had been secretly together. He had kissed that spot behind her ear until she had given up on her hair and decided to wear it down.

He had known she would be here tonight, of course, captivating and luminous, making intelligent conversation as she mingled. He’d braced himself for her loose mane and her bright eyes and the likelihood that she would try to take him home for the night. He was so determined to turn her down that it would be difficult not to be rude. 

“Viktor. Good to see you.” She beamed up at him, pressing her hand into his. He gave it a perfunctory kiss, meeting her eyes. They had done this song and dance before.

“You look lovely,” he said evenly. “As always.” Hermione fidgeted with her earring, her face inscrutable. 

“Where’s Elena?” she asked, scanning the room. Her voice was pleasant but much higher than usual and oddly pinched. 

_Good_ , he thought. It wasn’t that he wanted her to suffer, exactly. But he did find it somewhat reassuring to know that he wasn’t alone. 

“We broke up,” he said. “Over a year ago.” He took a long sip of his firewhisky, savoring the burn. 

“Oh,” she said, eyes wide. “Oh, Viktor, I’m so sorry.” But he could already see the machinations beginning behind her sympathetic gaze.

“It was for the best.” He rubbed the bridge of his nose with his thumb. When he looked back up, she was still gazing at him, her rich brown eyes lit with amber in the damned candlelight. 

“Ah, if it isn’t our Hermione!” A portly older man in an emerald velvet smoking jacket abruptly pushed his way nearly between them. 

Hermione turned towards him with resigned recognition. “Professor Slughorn, have you met my friend Viktor Krum? I understand you’ll be colleagues at Hogwarts this school year . . . ” 

Viktor bristled slightly at “friend” even though their past dalliances were a well-guarded secret and people didn’t usually go around introducing their old flames as ex-lovers. He didn’t feel rational tonight. 

“Ah yes!” Slughorn extended a hand, gesticulating with the other, which grasped a snifter of brandy. “We’ve met before, naturally — you remember, Viktor — through my dear friend Gwenog Jones. You know Gwenog, of course, right, my boy?”

Viktor, who had never seen this man before in his life, simply nodded. 

“Professor Slughorn teaches Potions,” Hermione explained with a slight tone of apology. 

“We’ll be quite lucky to have you at Hogwarts this year, teaching flying! You’ll have to come round of an evening for some mead — not poisoned, this time, obviously!” The professor chuckled nervously, glancing sideways at Hermione, who was opening her mouth and closing it again without speaking, rather like a gasping fish. Viktor furrowed his brow but said nothing. 

Slughorn persisted, undeterred. “Perhaps we could get young Harry Potter — and his wife Ginny — she flies for the Harpies, you know — there they are just over there — to come along, chat Quidditch! Our Hermione here could join us.” Here he slung a companionable arm around her shoulder. Hermione stiffened. Viktor had never met anyone so oblivious to social cues. The man was still speaking. 

“Well, I oughtn’t be surprised that the Brightest Witch of Her Age would have _befriended_ the youngest professional Quidditch Seeker in a century. I suppose you met during the Triwizard Tournament, then?” 

Hermione and Viktor both stilled, the air suddenly heavy, and Slughorn immediately realized his mistake. “Terrible business, that, of course. Terrible business. Tragic.” He shook his head sadly and his enormous mustache shuddered. 

Hermione twiddled her champagne flute and bit her lip. Viktor looked down at his shoes and cleared his throat.

“Pardon me, Professor Slughorn.” Hermione looked away, still twirling her glass. “Only, eh — I had promised Viktor I would show him —” 

She peered at Viktor searchingly. She always had been a terrible liar. 

“The moon,” Viktor supplied easily. He extended a bent elbow towards her, and she slid her arm through it. 

“Ah,” Slughorn sighed, his eyes gleaming in sudden understanding. “To be young and in love!” He raised his glass. “Don’t worry,” he added, lowering his voice conspiratorially. “Your secret is safe with me. You know, Albus Dumbledore himself always said I was famously good at keeping secrets . . .” 

“Now, now, Horace.” Hermione’s smile was all playful rebuke. “Let’s not get carried away here. You know we’re only friends.” Viktor winced slightly at that terrible word again, even if it was not strictly inaccurate. Still, it pained him. 

“Whatever you say, my dear.” The professor winked at them and raised his brandy in salute. 

“Good evening, Professor!” Hermione called over her shoulder as she steered Viktor towards a set of French doors that led outdoors.

When they were out of earshot, she looked up at him with a rueful grin. “Thanks for saving me. Us. My god, that man. But the moon?” She laughed and nudged his ribs with her elbow. “Horace cannot keep his mouth shut. And we’ve gotten soft. Brace for a spate of tabloid rumors.”

Viktor’s lips quirked. “What should I have said you would be showing me?” He had tried to keep his voice neutral, but somehow it still sounded suggestive. 

Hermione smirked and rolled her eyes. They had reached the door and he held it open, then stepped through just behind her, his hand guiding the small of her back. Her dress was backless, and his thumb brushed softly over her spine. She glanced back at him, her smile shy and slightly fragile as they moved into the cool night air. 

It was always so easy — too easy — to fall right back into it with her. 

He’d be insane to let himself get swept away again. To slip into her bed one more time, each time always supposedly the last time. She had broken his heart too many times already. This time, he had to be ready for when she made her move. 

* * *

**once my flame and twice my burn  
** _Tuesday, July 11, 2000_

Viktor was washing the dishes — doing tasks by hand helped him stay grounded and agile for flying — when Aquila soared through the window and dropped an envelope on the counter. Viktor’s chest clenched when he glimpsed the familiar sloping handwriting on the envelope. It had been months since he had heard from her. 

_Dear Viktor,_

_I’m so sorry it’s been so long since my last letter. My position at the Ministry has been rather demanding. How have you been this past year? The team is doing well, from what I’ve seen!_

_For my part, I’ve been alright; just busy. Though I have been in a bit of a mood, as Ron and I called our engagement off a few months back and we officially broke up. But it is all for the best, and I think in time he and I will go back to being good friends._

_Anyway, I wanted you to be the first to know that I’ve accepted a temporary position at the Bulgarian Ministry, as part of a pilot extended post-graduate educational program in International Magical Cooperation and Law. It’s all very exciting! Beginning in September, I’ll be living in Varna for nine months!_

_I hope we can meet and catch up. I’ve missed you, and it would be so lovely to see you again. I feel lucky to be going somewhere where I know I have a dear friend._

_xoxo  
_ _Yours,  
_ _Hermione Granger_

Viktor dropped the letter on his desk and paced around his flat. He poured and drank a shot of firewhisky, in direct defiance of his strict training diet. He summoned his English-Bulgarian dictionary and tried to parse the meaning of “yours” in this context, comparing it to the stiff “sincerely” that had ended her last dozen letters. 

He Apparated to the pitch and flew 100 laps, then sunk onto the bleachers and caught his breath before flying 100 laps in the opposite direction. He considered at length the phrase “dear friend” to no clear conclusion. 

He cooked stuffed peppers without using magic, trying to focus on his body rather than his racing thoughts. He pondered the indecipherable “xoxo” with a furrowed brow. He took a hot bath. And then, finally, he sat down with his quill. 

Viktor wrote a line or two about his quiet life: flying, studying Advanced Transfiguration, learning to cook. He dashed off a line of sincere condolence about the end of her relationship; he did feel for her, though he had never been a great fan of the Weasley. He wrapped it up with an offer to help her get settled in Bulgaria. He would include a parcel with some books on Bulgaria that she’d enjoy. He took a deep breath before signing off:

 _With love,  
_ _Viktor Krum_ _  
_

His heart was pounding against his rib cage. He could feel his blood in his ears. 

She was coming to live in Bulgaria. For nearly a year. 

She had said she was _his_.

Most likely that was just a way of signing letters.

Still, it stirred something mysterious deep within him, the same mysterious something that thrilled and churned at the thought of her here, in his flat, telling him all of her thoughts on the organization of the Bulgarian Ministry while he fed her his homemade gyuveche. 

The one who got away. He had thought. 

The one and only Hermione Granger.

* * *

**you look like a movie, you sound like a song  
** _Saturday, August 27, 2011_

From the terrace, they could still hear the band beginning a waltz. Standing so close to him in the night air saying nothing in an atmosphere this romantic was more than Hermione could bear.

She turned to him with a cheeky smile. She bowed, with an exaggerated flourish, and offered him her hand. 

Viktor narrowed his eyes skeptically, but his lip was starting to quirk. 

“Dance with me,” she said. She cast doe eyes at him, playfully. “For old time’s sake.”

Viktor inhaled sharply through his nose and sighed, chuckling. “Alright,” he said, “but I lead.”

* * *

**when we were young  
** _Sunday, December 25, 1994_

The night was a haze of fairy lights and waltzes. He had bowed, and offered her his hand, and since then, they had danced. 

Hermione didn’t usually care much about appearances, but tonight she felt pretty in her periwinkle dress, and tonight it felt good to feel pretty. And Viktor, well. He could have come with anyone, couldn’t he have? And yet he’d chosen her, and been a perfect gentleman all night long. She cast a glance at Harry and Ron, sulking at a table next to the clearly disappointed Patil twins. Unlike some boys. It was refreshing, frankly. 

Viktor’s hands were warm on her waist, and she felt flushed from dancing. The music had slowed. Closing her eyes, Hermione rested her head, very tentatively, on his chest.

It was nice, and strangely intimate, to feel his chest expanding against her cheek as he breathed. With her ear pressed to his ribs, she could hear the frantic hammering of his heart. 

She buried her smile in his shirt front. It was somehow reassuring, to know that he was nervous too. 

\--<>\--

_Thursday, May 18, 1995  
_

Hermione wound her arms around Viktor’s neck, as she deepened their kiss, pushing him gently against the back wall of the greenhouse. They were blocked from view of the castle by a convenient garden shed. 

“No,” Viktor said, carefully disentangling himself. 

“But why not?” Hermione tugged at his collar, trying and failing to pull him back to her. “You want to snog as much as I do.”

“Of course I do. Her-MY-oh-knee.” Viktor raised a brow at her, and she smiled. He had worked on that. He took her hands in his and stroked the padding between her thumb and forefinger, flashing her a sweetly crooked little smile. “But you know why not.”

Hermione sighed and cast herself rather dramatically against the greenhouse wall next to him. “I’m _very_ mature,” she said, tossing up her hands in emphasis.

“You’re very young,” he said. His eyes were soft as he looked at her. He kissed her hand fondly. “We must be slow.” The weight of it sat heavily upon him. She was still a girl — a beautiful, intelligent, fiery girl — but he was eighteen. Supposedly, a man. No matter what she thought she wanted, to do any more than hold her hand and kiss her chastely wouldn’t be right. 

“Fine, then!” Hermione narrowed her eyes at him playfully, then pulled his hand. She tugged him towards the edge of the Black Lake, where they spent the rest of the afternoon on a blanket, reading in the spring sunshine and not thinking about the future.

\--<>\--

_Friday, September 15, 2000_

Hermione’s first two weeks in Bulgaria had been a success. 

Viktor had helped her unpack her flat while Matilda had watched him intently, then waggled her brows at Hermione knowingly. Apparently news of Viktor’s Quidditch prowess had made it across the pond to Ilvermorny as well. 

He had shown her the sights of Varna, including the Sea Garden and an extremely impressive magical library. Most of the texts were in Cyrillic, but that hadn’t dampened her enthusiasm. He had kept a prudent distance, but there were still photos on page six of the _Prophet_ the next day _. Viktor Krum Rekindles Old Flame._ Rita Skeeter clearly had Bulgarian sources.

Now she was sat across from him in his flat. September here was warm and languid; a pleasant evening breeze tossed the curtains. Dinner had been delicious. The plates had been cleared. Now he sat across from her, regarding her openly. His smile made her feel slightly dizzy. 

She rested her hand on the table, closer to him than it strictly needed to be. 

He grasped her hand, never breaking eye contact. He ran his thumb over that same spot on her hand, just as he always had. 

She shivered.

“Should I close the window?” he asked.

“No,” she said. She looked out the window at the lights of the city, gathering her thoughts. 

She looked back, smiling at him with sad eyes. She reached out her other hand, clasping his warm, rough fingers with both of her hands. “Why did you choose me?”

Viktor crinkled his brow and tilted his head. 

“Back in school. You could have had anyone. Why did you choose me?” Her voice broke slightly, but her gaze didn’t waver from his. She waited.

He took his time. 

Viktor cupped both of her hands with both of his. His eyes burned into hers. “You are smart,” he said, “and passionate. And beautiful. And interesting.” She noticed that he was speaking in present tense. “And you have always looked at me like I was real, like you see the real me. No one else ever has.”

Hermione rose and walked to his chair. She stood before him, heart pounding. He watched her as she slowly climbed over his knees, straddling him. She cupped his jaw in her hand.

She thought of the lonely teenage nights after they’d parted, covertly working her hand into her knickers in her curtained bed after she was sure her roommates were asleep. She was coming to him now with years of pent-up want. 

She took a deep breath, and kissed him like she had always wanted to but never had: fervent and hungry and wild, gripping his neck and raking her fingers through his hair and grinding her hips against him.

Viktor groaned into her mouth and kissed her back with abandon. The old chemistry bloomed and flared, surging through her at his touch. He cupped her arse, tangled his fingers through her curls. Grasping her bottom with both hands, he scooped her up and backed her against the wall, where he pinned one of her wrists with one hand while kissing her throat. She clawed at his back, panting into his ear. He lifted her again and dropped her gently onto the counter. 

Before he could kiss her again, she tossed her head back and laughed. She ground her palms into her eyes, then threw her arms up at the heavens, still laughing, before smiling her secret smile at him. 

“What?” he asked, smiling his secret smile right back at her. 

“You have no idea how long I’ve wanted to do that.”

He grinned. “Oh, believe me, I do.” 

\--<>\--

_Tuesday, June 19, 2001_

“What are you doing with her, Viktor?” Dimo took a sip of his Turkish coffee and set it down with a world-weary sigh, summoning a look that made it clear that Viktor was making his life very difficult. 

“I love her,” Viktor said. The words out loud were a revelation to him, as he had not told her yet. 

Dimo groaned and pressed his hands to his temples. As Bulgaria’s Team Manager, he had both on- and off-field responsibilities. “The press will eat her alive, Viktor. Both of you, but especially her. She wants, what, to go into politics? Run for Minister someday?” 

Viktor nodded.

“Well, she can forget that, if she’s with you,” Dimo said. “I’m not saying it’s not bullshit, but you know how they treat women who date Quidditch stars. She’ll be raked over the coals as an opportunistic gold-digger.”

Viktor knit his brows. “She’s universally beloved. She has an Order of Merlin.” His voice had a jagged edge. 

“Death threats!” Dimo slapped the table. 

“We both already get those.”

“Expect three times as many. And this — all of this — is if you _marry_ her. Right now, you know you’re on thin ice. Your contract stipulates —" 

“We’ve kept it a secret. At _your_ request!” A vein in Viktor’s jaw twitched. 

“She’s not good at keeping secrets, my friend,” Dimo said, taking another slug of his coffee. “Do you know how many Magically Binding Non-Disclosure Agreements I’ve had to track down on your behalf, Viktor? Her American flatmate, who has an attitude. Harry fucking Potter. If it leaks, I can’t protect either of you.”

“Protect her?” Viktor snorted and pushed his chair back. “I doubt it. I’m worth more to you if I’m single. That’s what all of this is.” 

“If you really love her,” Dimo said, “you’ll let her go. And if you refuse to do that, for the love of God, at least put a ring on it.” 

\--<>\--

_Friday, August 17, 2001_

When Viktor came back from practice, Hermione was standing by the window, looking out, with her back to him. 

“We need to talk,” she said, not turning to look at him. In the dim light of the apartment, she was a somber figure. 

He walked over to her and touched her shoulder. She stiffened. 

“I want to come to England with you,” he started, launching into the conversation he knew was overdue. “I’ve already spoken to several teams —”

“Viktor, I found the ring.” Her hands were clasped in front of her, and she was clutching a black velvet box between them. Her face was wet with tears.

“Hermione —”

“How would I ever know,” she said softly, wiping at her eyes, “if the proposal was from you or from Dimo?” She looked right into him as she blinked back her tears, radiating hurt. 

“Hermione —” Viktor looked down and brought his hand over his eyes, blinking hard. This was not how it was meant to go. 

“We’re too young,” she said with a sniffle. “We’ve only been together a year. Would you even be asking me if it wasn’t the only way we could go public?” 

“Forget about Dimo.” Viktor’s voice was urgent. He tugged at his hair. “Forget about the team, about the contract. I just want to be with you. I’ll go anywhere. We don’t have to get married. We can be public —”

“Don’t be naive, Viktor. You can’t just — there are legal consequences, to breaking a contract. And . . .” Her voice grew soft and she looked out the window again. “Dimo’s not wrong, Viktor.” She looked back at him, impossibly sad. “It wouldn’t be easy, for either of us. But do you know what you’d be asking me to give up?” 

She turned to him in the moonlight, her lip quivering. He _did_ know what he was asking her to give up, and he knew it wasn’t fair. He was sure she could see in his face that he knew. 

She handed him the ring box.

“I love you, Viktor,” she said through her tears. It was the nightmare rendition of a moment he had dreamed of. “I really do love you. But I can’t. Not now. And not this way.” 

He stood there in a daze while she gathered her things. He did not try to stop her when she left. He wouldn’t see her again for five years. 

* * *

**i'm so mad i'm getting old, it makes me reckless  
** _Saturday, August 27, 2011_

Hermione swayed gently in Viktor’s arms, her hands clasped against his back. The gentle refrains of a waltz drifted out onto the terrace, but they were dancing to a slower, private rhythm. 

“This is familiar.” Viktor’s warm breath fell on her ear as he spoke. “You’re even wearing blue.” 

A late summer breeze ruffled the trees, and the scent of roses wafted from the darkened gardens. The faintest sliver of a crescent moon hung in the inky sky. 

“You wouldn’t kiss me that night.” Hermione rested her cheek against his breastbone. She could hear his heart pounding, like it was the first time, like he was eighteen. 

“I might have,” Viktor said kindly, “if you hadn’t been so sad at the end of the night.”

Hermione sighed and looked up at him meaningfully. “Not the way I wanted you to.”

Viktor paused, then cocked a brow at her, his dashing crow’s feet crinkling in mirth. “So I never kissed you the way you wanted me to?” His voice was dangerously low, his dark eyes gleaming. 

He turned her slightly as they danced, and Hermione’s mind was flooded with involuntary memories of the flat in Varna, of Viktor depositing her on the kitchen counter and kissing her like it was his sole purpose in life. No other man had ever poured himself into her so completely, on the level of the soul, the way that he had. She had felt the lack of it since, acutely and often. 

Color was rising on her cheeks. She lifted her hand from his shoulder to cuff him gently on the arm. “Not the night of the Yule Ball,” she said, letting herself fall fully into the warmth of his eyes. 

Viktor looked at her carefully. His mouth was fond but his eyes were sad. He stroked one broad hand up and down over her ribs softly. “You were very young,” he said.

“We both were,” Hermione said quietly, her gaze unwavering, “but we aren’t anymore.” 

She wanted him to merge with her again in the way they always had, just for tonight. Just to see if it was how she remembered it, how it had been. It went beyond bodies; when it happened she felt it in the air around them. But she felt an unfamiliar distance emanating from him tonight, as though he had built some hesitant wall of resistance. She longed to knock it down.

“What if —” she breathed softly, pressing herself closer to him. Something dangerous was racing in Hermione’s veins and her second glass of champagne had gone right to her head. “— we were at the ball again now, but as adults?” 

Viktor’s shoulders stiffened and he closed his eyes for a moment, breathing heavily.

She peered up at him tremulously, waiting for him to look at her again. “How did you want to kiss me then? How would you kiss me now?”

He only sighed sorrowfully and looked a question at her. _Why this?_ or perhaps _Why now?_ She wanted to kiss him anyway, in case it was the last time they might be exactly how they were before. An illusion perhaps, that they could still be so good, or even that they ever had been, but the possibility of finding out was irresistible. Before she could overthink it, she threaded her hands around his neck and surged up towards him. 

“No,” he said, gently holding her back. His brow was creased and his eyes flashed but he only sounded exhausted. He disentangled himself from her and strode briskly towards the French doors and back into the ballroom, casting a wounded look over his shoulder at her.

“Viktor!” she called, stumbling after him in her heels. “Wait!”

She had just entered the ballroom when Viktor stopped in his tracks, his clenched fist twitching. 

He turned, flashing her a searing look. Then he strode back towards her and grasped her by the waist, wrapping one arm almost completely around her. Clutching her bare shoulder blade with his other hand, he kissed her fervently, immediately plunging his tongue into her mouth. 

The wall she’d felt from him before had collapsed. The fire that had always burned between them hadn’t gone out. It _was_ still like it had been when they were young. If possible, the fire burned hotter now.

Hermione kissed him back, so immersed in his touch that she completely forgot herself, her surroundings. When she had relaxed into him, her arms tangled around his neck, he dipped her back, still kissing her, until one of her feet left the ground. He clutched her hips to his tightly. 

Viktor abruptly brought her to her feet and drew back slightly. She wobbled against him, panting and breathless. His features were intense with raw want and some darker, more conflicted thing. His bearing promised that he was about to push her against the wall and kiss her again. His face expressed an explicit intent to ruck up the skirt of her formal dress robes and press his hand between her legs. His eyes declared a desire to throw her down on the floor and fuck her right here in the Ministry ballroom, in front of the press and all of her colleagues and a sea of gawping partygoers. 

She felt as though she might let him. 

Instead, Viktor released her and stepped several paces back. She became vacantly aware of flashbulbs, hushed murmurs, a terrible silence resonating through the ballroom. At some point the musicians had stopped playing. Somehow, they were standing in the center of the dance floor.

Hermione staggered, struggling to come to balance on her high heels, and gaped up at him. Her mind was still reeling.

“This —" Viktor spat, gesturing between them, “— has always been on your terms. And you’ve broken my heart —" He blinked and swallowed, heaving a deep breath before continuing, "— every time, Hermione. You got your last kiss. Now leave me in peace.” 

Her composure, long-built and hard-won, evaporated. She brushed at her eyes, stunned. She was hit by a sudden wave of revelations, in succession. That he was hurt. That she had hurt him, without knowing it. That he still cared; perhaps he had all along. That when she had taken him back into her bed — at the conference in Paris, when she’d business in Bulgaria, a handful of other times — that she had actually been scraping at scabs she didn’t know he had. 

That she cared too. Why else would she keep going back? Why else, tonight, was she baiting him with nostalgia, pining for one more taste? 

She had been holding her finger in the dam, possibly for years, but now it was bursting. And so she found herself chasing after him as he jogged out of the building, blinking back tears. Beginning to cry in earnest, she attempted to claw off her infernal shoes as she pursued him down the grand staircase, nearly tripping. Giving up, she sank to her knees at the bottom of the stairs. 

Then there was Harry, wrapping a cloak around her and barking at reporters and leading her out to where they could safely Apparate away. She sat numbly on the sofa at her flat while he and Ginny fussed about, making her tea, wrapping her in a blanket. It wasn’t until she was clasping the warm cup, feeling her breath finally coming even, that she realized the full magnitude of what had just happened. 

After years of keeping their history a secret — painstakingly if poorly — they had aired absolutely all of their dirty laundry center stage before the entire wizarding world.

She pressed the heels of her hands into her eye sockets and let out a hollow, hysterical laugh. 

“Have you ever seen her like this before?” Ginny asked quietly, flashing concerned eyes at Harry, who could only shrug helplessly. 

“There’s no need to speak about me in the third-person, I’m fine,” Hermione said, coming to herself abruptly. “There’s nothing to be done for it.” She threw her hands up ruefully, then swiped hopelessly at her ruined make-up. “We haven’t been together for years. I’ll survive, I’m sure. Though my dignity may not,” she added with a humorless laugh. 

She crossed to where they were huddled near the kitchen and kissed both of their cheeks. 

“Go,” she said, flapping her arms at them until they moved cautiously towards the Floo. “I’m going to bed.” 

“Em, alright then,” Harry said, giving Hermione’s arm a parting pat. “We’ll look in on you tomorrow, yeah?”

“If you must,” Hermione groaned, pushing them towards the Floo. When they were finally gone, she began the hard work of preparing herself to spend the next six hours lying in the dark staring disconsolately at the ceiling. 

* * *

**i was on to every play, i just wanted you  
** _Sunday, September 4, 2011_

The owl from Harry read:

_Just talk to her._

Viktor sighed as he folded and unfolded it again, pacing around his hut behind the Hogwarts Quidditch pitch, waiting for her to arrive. He hoped that he would not regret this. 

A rap came at the door, and he thrust it open, looming warily in the doorway. Hermione peered up at him, her eyes wide, looking very small. An autumn chill had blown in over the weekend, and she shrank into her oversized cloak. 

“Come in,” Viktor said, feeling his heart softening to her despite his better efforts. 

She sat at his small table, and he joined her. 

Hermione took a deep breath and met his eyes. “I’m sorry.” 

Blinking, she looked down, regarding her folded hands as he watched her with interest. “I never meant to hurt you. I — I didn’t realize you still cared. I didn’t realize I still cared — I never let myself think about it, frankly, the past few years when you were with Elena.”

She sighed and rested her hand on the table, closer to him than was strictly necessary. 

“I’m so sorry,” she said. He did not doubt her sincerity.

He grasped her hand, never breaking eye contact. He squeezed it three times. She swallowed and took a deep breath. 

“So am I,” he said. “I should have told you.” 

“That you were hurt?” she asked. She was watching his thumb, which he was rubbing reassuringly over the spot on her hand. His favorite spot. 

He shrugged his shoulders. He cupped her chin with his free hand, and she looked at him. Her eyes were wet but they were always fierce. 

“That I was hurt. But also — back then. That I wanted you to live with me. That I loved you. That I wanted to marry you. That I would have sacrificed anything to be with you. There are a lot of things I should have told you.” He smiled sadly.

“There are a lot of things I should have told you too,” she said. She squeezed his hand four times.

The question was hanging in the air before she asked it.

“Do you think we could try again?” Her voice was very quiet. She sat before him with her face wide open.

“What’s different?” he asked. He wanted to hear her say it. 

“Plenty,” she said, quirking her lips at him. “We’re learning how to talk. My career is underway. Your career is —” she gestured at his hut, which was very nice as huts go, “—different than it was then. We’re both inured to the press. We live in the same country now. . .” 

Hermione lifted her other hand, so that his was clutched between both of hers. She tilted her head and smiled at him. 

He shook his head with a little laugh. He grasped both of her hands in both of his. 

“We’re not so young anymore,” she added.

“We’re not,” he agreed. He smiled his secret smile, the one reserved only for her. 

She stood and crossed over to his chair. His heart was hammering in his chest. Before she could clamber onto him, he pulled her so she was sitting sideways on his lap. He pressed his forehead to hers. He was shaking.

“If we try this,” he said, “it’s not all at once.”

Hermione nodded from an inch away. Her nose brushed his. She cupped his jaw.  
  
“We must go slow,” she said, with a sweetness that melted him. She brushed her lips against his as though they both might break. 

It wasn’t like his kiss, which had been an exit strategy. It had been real and passionate, but he had meant it as a goodbye. 

Hermione’s kiss was different, tentative. It was spring. It was innocence. It was uncertainty. 

He wrapped his arms around her and kissed her back, very softly. 

It was a beginning.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you all so much for reading, and thanks to everyone who voted for this story!!! Everyone's amazing comments and kudos got me through this comp! 😍
> 
> Posting date modified from April 11, 2020 to April 27, 2020 to reflect date of competition reveals. 
> 
> Harry Potter characters are the property of J.K. Rowling and Bloomsbury/Scholastic. No copyright infringement is intended. No profit is being made from this creation.


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